


The Start of Something Good

by JerseyGirl



Category: Hawaii Five-0 (2010)
Genre: F/M, Falling In Love, Friendship/Love, Get Together, Holding Hands, Introspection, Late at Night, M/M, Male Friendship, One Shot, POV Danny "Danno" Williams, Realization, Smile
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-07-10
Updated: 2012-07-10
Packaged: 2017-11-09 13:19:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,672
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/455891
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JerseyGirl/pseuds/JerseyGirl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Nighttime was always the worst time, because it was when the solitude and the silence made his mind go all wonky.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Start of Something Good

**Author's Note:**

> It started flowing from my fingers, I know not why...but here you go!

Nighttime was always the worst time, because it was when the solitude and the silence made his mind go all wonky. He didn’t have anyone to talk to, anyone to rant at. There was nobody to question, there were no suspects to book. No paperwork to pore through against the backdrop of the constant hum of their HQ electronic equipment and the sounds of his teammates working: talking on the phone, tapping away at their keyboards, cursing in frustration, getting another cup of coffee or munching on something from the fridge. 

There was no Grace chatter because even when he had her, by this time at night, she was sleeping peacefully, hopefully dreaming of unicorns and rainbows and princesses, and not about having been kidnapped or the fact that her father shot her stepfather. 

Tonight he didn’t have Grace, though. Tonight he was alone, as he usually was. Things with Gabby had been hot and heavy for a while, but it had sort of petered out into a strong friendship rather than anything romantic. He hadn’t even slept with her, because they both sort of realized, quietly, without words, that it wasn’t meant to be more than what it was now. 

And Danny was okay with that, he really was, because with Gabby having been the first non-Rachel person he’d even tried to date since arriving in Hawaii, the first one he even had any real interest in, he wasn’t really sure _what_ to expect. It had been about Rachel for so long. 

But the thing about this was, he had figured out during these long nighttimes of having too much time on his hands to think, his attraction to Gabby hadn’t waned due to her not being Rachel. It had nothing to do with Rachel in any way, shape or form. 

Because while he’d been having coffee with her, or dinner, or hanging out with her and Grace, the person who’d kept interrupting his thoughts, stuttering his conversational skills, popping up in front of his mind’s eye like a damn Whack-a-Mole, wasn’t Rachel. No. The person he kept thinking about was Steve. 

Which was disturbing at first. 

He would tell a joke and Gabby would laugh, either politely or for real, and all Danny could hear was Steve’s snort. All he could see was Steve’s Oh-No-You-Did-NOT-Just-Say-That Face. 

He would talk about Grace’s latest achievement in school, or what book she was reading, or who was pulling her pigtails on the playground, and Gabby would smile, nod, ask questions. She seemed genuinely interested, but in some way also detached. And all Danny could see was Steve’s Serious Face as he seemed to be cataloguing every single thing Danny said about his precious little girl’s latest adventures. All he could hear was Steve asking questions to get more detail about the achievement, the book or the boy chasing her. 

He would tell Gabby his favorite foods, and those he considered abominations. He would tell her his favorite color, favorite time of day, favorite season – if one lived in a place that _had_ seasons, of course – and what he considered his lucky number. And when Gabby smiled and divulged these same things about herself, all Danny could think of was the fact that Steve knew _all_ of these things already, and not because they’d sat across a table from each other spouting facts like they had to be walking encyclopedias of themselves, but because when you are with someone as many hours a week as he and Steve were, the things just sort of naturally came out in the course of Life. 

He could hear Steve’s real, true, belly-deep laugh instead of Gabby’s faint, gentle one. 

He could hear Steve barking at him in the midst of a firefight rather than Gabby’s sweet, lilting voice. 

He could see Steve’s large, hazel eyes and his colorful tattoos rather than Gabby’s pretty face and soft, flowing hair. 

And when Danny decided to be honest with himself, he realized late one night that he thought about his partner a _lot_. 

When he was with Grace, he talked about Steve – most times at her request, of course, always firing questions at him about her adopted uncle, but still. 

When he was on the phone with his mother, father or one of his sisters, he talked about Steve – because they always asked about work, and most of Danny’s work was done at Steve’s side, so there you had it. 

When he was in his car, eighty percent of the time it was with Steve driving. 

Well, maybe ninety percent. 

A lot. 

So much of Danny’s life, he now saw, revolved around his partner, even things that had nothing to do with the task force. 

They had shared so much over the past couple of years. Everything from heartache to heartbreak. From joy to pain – in all forms physical, mental, emotional. They’d been through nearly dying on more than one occasion. They’d shared fights, apologies, laughter. They’d shared camaraderie, both just alone and with their teammates. They’d seen Chin married, they’d watched fellow cops die. They’d had Grace Time together, they’d talked on the phone about this, that or the other thing. 

They had been through a lot. All four of them had. But the one always on his mind, was Steve. 

And that was why he hated nighttime the most, because it was times like right now, as he lay in his nice, new bed in his newly-rented apartment, in the dark, that he started thinking too much about that fact. 

All he could conclude, was that he had a thing for his partner. A thing that went far beyond bro-manship or partnership or friendship. A thing that was, disturbingly, very much like he might be feeling if he was in love, either falling or already there. 

But tonight, it turned out, was different from most of his nights spent alone in his quiet apartment. He knew it the second a knock sounded at his front door. The second he looked out of the peephole at two thirty-seven in the morning, to see his partner looking like he hadn’t even been to bed yet. Not looking sleepy at all. 

Neither was Danny, though, so that worked. 

He undid the locks, slid the chain on the door off its track, opened it. Stepped back. Steve walked in. 

And just stood there. 

“I have no idea what I’m doing here,” Steve offered. 

Danny half-shrugged as he closed the door and locked everything back up again. “Can’t sleep, like me?” 

“Yeah,” Steve said on an exhale, running a hand through his hair. 

Danny was so glad Steve was there. 

_So_ glad. 

Because tonight, for the first time in a long time, he was no longer alone. 

“Maybe need some company?” 

“Maybe,” Steve admitted. 

Danny turned around to find Steve’s eyes on him. He quirked a little smile. “You want to start drinking at a quarter to three in the morning?” 

“Not really,” Steve replied with a shake of his head. And he was still looking intently at his partner’s face. 

Danny looked right back, not even flinching. “You’re a little edgy,” he observed. “Any particular reason?” 

Because Danny had an inkling about this whole situation. Steve had never just showed up at Danny’s apartment in the middle of the night before unless there was something case-related involved, and always then, a phone call to alert him to be dressed and ready in ten had preceded said visit. 

So Danny thought he might be on to something here, and wanted to see if he was right. If he was…he couldn’t fathom the possibilities, because he’d never really thought about it seriously before, having only just had his Steve-related epiphany six nights prior. 

“I, uh…” Steve’s voice trailed off, he shuffled his feet, scratched at his chin with his index finger. 

Humor. That always worked. Mask the truth with a chuckle. “You missed me, didn’t you,” he stated as fact. “You could not bear to spend another minute without me,” he continued, amused, a big smile on his face, mirth in his voice. “You wanted to see me so bad that you decided risking my wrath by knocking on my door at this hour of the morning was worth it.” 

There. 

Humor. Right? 

Only maybe not so much, if he was to go by the look on Steve’s face. That swift moment where Steve looked gob smacked, shocked, surprised and scared shitless in the space of maybe half of half of a second. 

Holy shit. Humor not withstanding, Danny had hit it on the nose. Right smack _dab_ on the nose. 

And Steve looked like he was about to bolt. 

So Danny stepped forward, raised his hand and cupped Steve’s elbow. Steve didn’t pull away. 

Which made Danny feel confident enough to slide his hand down the underside of Steve’s forearm. Steve didn’t move, but didn’t look like he wanted to bolt anymore. 

And _that_ made Danny move his hand down so that his palm was against Steve’s palm. He searched his partner’s eyes, which in turn, searched his own. A tiny little smile began to form on Steve’s lips. 

Danny closed his fingers around Steve’s hand. 

Steve did the same. 

Then both of them looked down at their joined hands. 

“Feeling better?” Danny asked, because he always had to say _some_ thing. 

“Yeah,” Steve acknowledged with a nod, and maybe a little bit of red dotting his cheekbones. 

Their eyes met. They both smiled. 

Danny’s heart was thudding like a bass drum on fast-forward. 

His stomach felt like it was filled with butterflies. 

He couldn’t stop smiling. 

He knew, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that this moment right here, this moment in the middle of the night on a nondescript Friday-into-Saturday with no life-or-death situations, no big, long-winded confessions and no hesitance on the part of either man, was the start of something good. 

Steve squeezed his hand and all-out grinned. Danny found himself doing the same. 

Yeah. 

Something _really_ good. 


End file.
